


falling for you

by iwillalwaysbelieve



Series: college aus??? how did this start [1]
Category: Produce 101 (TV), Wanna One (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Fluff, I love my boys, M/M, Rated for swearing, and i guess a few minor mentions of sex that i guess can be taken as something else so, anyway i just wanted more college!ongniel, credit for all the psych facts goes to mr. lindsay, do you think he'd be proud of me, he was proud of that one student a few years ago who wrote star wars fic so, he's Dramatic okay let him be, jisung is just mentioned, literally just cute, love that man, maybe? - Freeform, minki and minhyun technically i guess are just really really minor characters, same with jaehwan bless his heart, seongwoo basically speaks in italics in this i'm sorry, so i wrote some
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-02
Updated: 2017-07-02
Packaged: 2018-11-22 06:12:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,615
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11374230
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iwillalwaysbelieve/pseuds/iwillalwaysbelieve
Summary: Ong Seongwoo did not ever think he would find out what it feels like to fall off of a treadmill. (it hurts.) He also didn't think he would ever manage to score a date with Kang Daniel. (he does.)





	falling for you

Seongwoo likes to think he’s a runner. He’s athletic, sure, and too slim to consider lifting weights seriously or he’ll ruin what his fangirls call his “trim figure”, so he focuses on the treadmills at the gym, when he goes, and tries not to make himself look like an idiot in front of the track team when they come for personal workouts.

He doesn’t really pay much attention to where other guys are pushing themselves through sets with dumbbells larger than the width of his thighs, though sometimes he glances up and gets a _really_ nice view of some attractive guy’s biceps straining as he bench presses what is probably more weight than Seongwoo dripping wet, and then he doesn’t necessarily mind. That side of the gym is untouchable, a far-off land of actual muscles and brawny frat boys and the football team, so Seongwoo sticks to his favorite treadmill, except when Jonghyun comes.

When Jonghyun comes Seongwoo occasionally has to venture to the other side of the gym to force him away from the machines to go get food, and it’s on one of those days that Seongwoo sees the boy he thinks he falls in love with the second they lock eyes.

Somehow, even sweaty and focused, in a ratty tank-top and old basketball shorts, the boy is _stunning_. He flicks caramel hair out of his eyes as he focuses on the dumbbells he’s lifting above his shoulders, shoulders broad and defined, and Seongwoo figures the muscle in his arms would be very good for a very different kind of exercise, and _fuck_ he just noticed Seongwoo staring and raised an eyebrow in a very attractive look of disdain, and Seongwoo wants to melt into the ground and disappear.

“...promised Minhyun I’d help him review esters before his test tomorrow because orgo is kicking his ass, and—Seongwoo, what the fuck.” Jonghyun just sounds tired when Seongwoo snaps back to attention.

This is a relatively common experience, but _listen_ , Seongwoo is a psych major with a theatre minor and if he’s staring at someone it’s for a character study or to try to figure out if they’re still in the identity/role confusion stage of development or have moved on to intimacy/isolation based on the way they appraise passersby because Seongwoo has nothing but the purest of intentions at all times always.

(Except maybe the time he tried to make out with Jonghyun while heavily inebriated freshman year, but he doesn’t talk about that.)

Jonghyun stands and tugs Seongwoo out of the room. “Who…” Seongwoo sighs as he glances in the reflection in the window of the door and manages to catch the attractive boy as he sets his weights down and runs a hand through his hair, looking like a model for some sports magazine Seongwoo has forgotten the name to. “Who is that?”

“Who?” Jonghyun looks back as well. “Light brown hair, ‘Swoledemort’ shirt?” Seongwoo nods, already planning his outfit for the next time he goes to the gym. “Kang Daniel. One of Jisung-hyung’s friends. Some kind of performing arts major, I think.”

Seongwoo perks up at that. “Performing arts?”

“Seongwoo, you’re only a performing arts minor, stop acting like you’re the king of the theatre department.”

Seongwoo pouts his way through the walk back to the dorm until Jonghyun promises to try to get more information from Jisung, but he rolls the name Daniel around on his tongue for the next week until he works up the courage to go back to the gym.

He heads for his favorite treadmill immediately, hoping the bars in the front are low enough to show off his shirt to anyone (Daniel) who may happen to look over. He surveys the other side of the room carefully, hoping for a certain mop of caramel hair, but the best he gets is a glare from the guy he thinks is one of the offensive linemen on the football team, so he turns away with a disappointed twist to his lips and tries to focus on running.

If he goes back to the gym every day for two weeks and subsequently memorizes Daniel’s schedule, well, blame his health psychology class and his habit of accidentally memorizing the schedule of anyone he’s interested in. After that he restricts himself to a few days a week like a healthy person should (it’s not because he was almost too sore to move after two weeks of considerably more exercise than he was used to), and if those days happen to coincide with Daniel’s, what can he say?

Jonghyun just sighs when he sees what Seongwoo is doing, Minhyun laughs, and Minki looks overly prepared to involve himself and stick his pretty nose where it shouldn’t be until Seongwoo reminds him that doing so would require actually working out for once in his life.

Seongwoo catches himself daydreaming more often than he would like, wondering in health psych if Daniel knows that exercising stimulates serotonin production, realizes he’s comparing his partners in his stage combat class to Daniel’s defined musculature. It’s not too much of a surprise, really, given Seongwoo’s penchant for falling in love frequently and rapidly.

He’s convinced he just has to wait it out until another pretty person catches his eye; Jonghyun reported Daniel is incredibly popular among the dance majors, has both girls and boys practically throwing themselves at him. Apparently he’s got something of a fanclub, which ruffles Seongwoo’s metaphorical feathers because he thought _he_ was the only one with a group of students devoted to freaking out about his appearance. He’s an incredible dancer ( _no_ , Seongwoo did _not_ go beg Jisung for a practice video, of _course_ not), and while Seongwoo knows he’s attractive, he’s also gangly and his ears stick out and he’s loud and over-the-top, but Daniel seems like the epitome of perfection, and Seongwoo is shy and doesn’t at all know how to approach guys like that, so he just doesn’t. Approach, that is.

He watches, though, for a month or two, and complains to anyone who will listen—usually Jonghyun, because that’s the kind of person Jonghyun is—about how beautiful Daniel is when he’s on his third set of pull-ups or how he’d like to be the reason Daniel’s tugging his shirt over his head and tossing it on the floor next to his bag. He’s spending less time trying to distract himself with some Netflix show playing on his phone, which he balances precariously next to the button to make the treadmill go faster, and more time studying Daniel and memorizing the lines of his body.

It’s another of his gym days, the first time he speaks to Kang Daniel. He’s on his favorite treadmill, of course, the one with the perfect view of Daniel doing box jumps onto what Seongwoo considers ridiculously high stools, and he’s fine with running and watching, because Daniel’s back is to the treadmills and therefore there’s no fear of being discovered.

But Seongwoo accepts defeat when Daniel pushes the stools to the side and picks up a set of dumbbells and turns around until he’s facing Seongwoo and Seongwoo can see the sweat that sticks Daniel’s tank-top to his chest. Daniel’s doing those curls so _effortlessly_ , though his muscles stand out prominently as a sign that it clearly is a workout, and Seongwoo vaguely registers the music playing in his ear is an OST from some drama he just finished watching with Jaehwan, some sappy thing, and Jaehwan will _swear_ later he has  _no idea_ how it got onto Seongwoo’s running playlist.

Just as this clicks in Seongwoo’s brain Daniel looks up and Seongwoo’s eyes widen because _Kang Daniel just made eye contact with him_ and he does his best to keep running, but then Daniel flicks his hair out of his eyes and _winks_ and _fuck_ , it hurts when you fall off a treadmill.

Seongwoo finds himself in a heap on the floor, knees and shins stinging from the scrape of the tread that continues its motion innocently, and with one of his earbuds tugged out of his ear he can hear almost everyone in the vicinity laughing at him. He groans, cataloguing aches and probable bruises and the blood running down his shin from the gash on his knee and the strawberry of a bruise that’s darkening on his elbow and the flash of pain from where he may have rolled his ankle when he hit the ground.

He glances back up at Daniel sheepishly, just in time to see Daniel double over in laughter (his smile is _beautiful_ , eyes crinkling up delightfully, bunny teeth flashing) and, in a move surprising for a dancer and someone usually so collected physically, drop one of his dumbbells square on his toe. It startles a laugh out of Seongwoo despite his pain when he can see Daniel swear, though the dancer is still laughing.

Brazened, for some reason, by the stupid fall and resulting injuries for the both of them, Seongwoo shoves himself to his feet, stops the treadmill, and limps his way over to Daniel.

“You good?”

Daniel blinks up at him, working on getting his breath back, and grins. “Fine. You don’t look so hot, though.”

“Bro, those dumbbells are _heavy_. What do you say we help each other to the health center?”

“Why would I help you?” Daniel raises a single eyebrow (Seongwoo _wishes_ he could do that, but every time he tries for just one the other goes with it) and smirks slightly, and Seongwoo’s more than a little flustered now that he’s close enough to see the beads of sweat on Daniel’s forehead, confronted by features that up close are somehow softer than he thought, and he stutters for a second.

“Be—because me getting hurt was your fault, and your getting hurt was my fault, so we should help each other.” He nods when he finishes, satisfied that he gave an acceptable answer.

With a shrug, Daniel gestures for Seongwoo to start walking, but winces the second he tries to take a step and latches onto Seongwoo for support. His hand digs into where Seongwoo’s shoulder skidded painfully on the linoleum floor, so Seongwoo shifts it to the side slightly, grimacing a little. Daniel is quick to realize what happened and apologizes hastily, tripping over his words, and Seongwoo dies a little inside because Daniel wasn’t supposed to be _cute_ , he was supposed to be some untouchable Adonis that Seongwoo was never destined to be clutching for dear life as they limp out of the gym and toward the health center with blood too close to staining his sock for him to be happy.

They make their way through the crowd of surprised students who came to investigate the crash, Seongwoo having regained enough of his composure and theatre bravado to nod imperiously at them as he passes, and a nice girl with a shock of dyed pink hair holds the door open for them. As luck would have it, the health center is a three minute walk at a normal pace. At the rate they’re going, it’s going to take seven (listen, when you have to time quick changes and how much time you have to shove food in your face and get into costume before the stage manager yells at you, you get precise about timing).

Seongwoo’s opening his mouth to start some awkward small talk when Daniel speaks. “I like your shirt.”

Seongwoo grins. “I thought you might. Saw you wearing yours and figured we should match, so.”

In any other place, the picture of Albus Dumbledore flexing with the slogan “Dumbbelldore” would garner a considerable amount of weird looks; on a college campus, it got more high-fives and fist bumps and offers to join the school Quidditch team. Daniel manages a slightly strained laugh, and now that he can hear it Seongwoo nearly falls again, because his laugh is as cute as his smile.

In the midst of his freak out, he realizes they haven’t actually introduced themselves, and he would find it _really_ awkward if he let slip that he knew Daniel’s name, so he offers his free hand, the one not wrapped around Daniel’s waist for support.

“Ong Seongwoo,” he says, and Daniel smiles a little.

“I know.”

“You _what?_ ”

Daniel won’t meet his eyes anymore, tugging his lip between his teeth. “I, um, I know your name?”

Seongwoo has to work not to stop dead in the middle of the sidewalk, and he’s suddenly much more conscious of the strong arm draped over his shoulders, warm and strangely familiar. “You—”

“I mean,” Daniel stutters, “it’s not like there are _that_ many Korean kids around here, and Ong is an unusual name even when there are?”

Seongwoo makes a face. “Tell me about it.”

Daniel, the less injured of the two, takes the hit to lean against the door to the health center to open it, and they limp inside. The boy at the desk doesn’t even bat an eye at the sight of them, just asks for their names.

Daniel coughs slightly, glancing at Seongwoo before he speaks. “Euigeon Kang.”

Seongwoo thinks he adds whiplash to the list of injuries as his head snaps around so he can stare at Daniel. “ _What?_ ”

As the boy at the front desk leads them to a place to sit and wait for an actual member of the medical staff Seongwoo rounds on Daniel. “The fuck kinda name is _Euigeon_? And how is that a thing when your name is Daniel?”

“Birth name Euigeon. Don’t like it much, take the opportunity when asked my name or preferred nickname by all my American friends to say Daniel since it’s easier for them.”

“So what you’re saying is I’ve been _lied_ to for the past two months.”

“I mean. Not technically?”

Seongwoo narrows his eyes. “Don’t even _think_ about hiding anything else from me. I’m a psych major, I’ll know if you’re lying.”

“Then you know I like you?”

Seongwoo is ready to fall out of his chair, and Daniel just looks smug. “You—what—listen, what the _fuck_ , Kang Daniel?”

Daniel grins, eyes crinkling, and Seongwoo wants to die. They’re mercifully interrupted by a member of the medical staff and their conversation is cut short in the midst of plastering band-aids on Seongwoo’s many scrapes and laughing their way through explaining how they got hurt. Seongwoo’s phone chimes, and he curses once he checks the message. Daniel looks at him in curiosity, maybe some mild alarm, so he hurries to clarify.

“Jonghyun says the dining hall is out of like every good food, and I ran out of cup ramen last night.”

“We can go to that coffeeshop down the block?” Daniel offers. “They have good sandwiches, and Hyunbin said their salads are decent.”

“Okay, yeah, here’s the thing.” Seongwoo thanks the man who had tended to their injuries, and they stand. “I have exactly fifty-eight cents in my bank account right now and I don’t get paid until Friday.”

“I’ll pay.” Daniel shrugs as they make their way out of the health center, both still limping, if a little less than before. “I, um, I have some money.” He seems a little embarrassed, but Seongwoo isn’t about to ask, not if it gets him a free meal with the boy he’s been crushing on for weeks.

They get some odd looks when they get off the official campus grounds, two college boys limping next to each other, one with a few Hello Kitty band-aids plastered across his knee and elbow and one cheek, sporting matching smiles, but they ignore it and laugh when a middle-aged woman glares at them. Seongwoo can’t tell if it’s for their shirts or for the fact that they’re walking close enough together that their hands brush every now and then, and if he wanted to (he does) he could link his pinky with Daniel’s.

As they enter the shop Daniel groans a little and pulls out his phone. “Gotta tell Jisung where I am or he’ll have all of the dance team fish out looking for me.”

“Does he really control all the freshmen?”

“Um, yeah. Complete control. I have no idea how he does it considering he’s not even _on_ the dance team.”

They order, and Daniel’s juggling his things as he tries to get his wallet out of his pocket, so Seongwoo takes his phone and keys to free his hands, right as Daniel gets a text. “Jisung?” he calls over his shoulder, and Seongwoo murmurs affirmation.

“He says—Daniel, the _fuck_ is the _get Kang Daniel a steady boyfriend_ fund?”

“Oh, fuck.” Daniel snatches his phone back immediately after taking the receipt from the cashier. “Nothing. Don’t worry about it.”

Seongwoo nudges him forward to where they are to wait for their food and grabs the phone. He snaps off a quick reply: _hey, jisung-hyung, this is ong seongwoo. what’s this fund you’re talking about?_

He doesn’t get to see Jisung’s response, which he considers a damn shame, but the food _is_ delicious and Daniel is funny and oddly charming even if he’s actually just a giant dork, and Seongwoo discovers he likes the way Daniel ducks his head and hides behind his hair a little when he gets embarrassed, so he takes it upon himself to tease Daniel as much as he possibly can. Daniel has his moments, however, of surprising flirtatiousness, and Seongwoo finds himself stuttering more than he wants to, but they laugh until Seongwoo’s cheeks hurt and he’s quickly forgetting the throbbing of his ankle and various scrapes, even as they walk back to their dorms.

It’s not _late_ , per se, just a time when most people are holed up in their rooms studying already, so it’s relatively quiet when they stop outside of Seongwoo’s dorm.

“Was this okay?” Daniel’s chewing his lip worriedly.

“What do you mean? This was great.”

“Not exactly how I’d planned to ask you out, but—”

“You’d planned to ask me out?”

“Yeah, basically ever since I first saw you when you were talking to Jonghyun and started staring at me. I saw _Midsummer_ last year, when you played Puck? I was the one you stole a wallet from during your ‘my mistress with a monster’ monologue and I was enchanted. But I wasn’t really ever sure how to start talking to you because you always seem like you have friends and you’re handsome and funny and I’m too awkward to approach you when you’re with people, so I just sorta...didn’t. I was gonna ask you to come to one of my dance performances and ask you out afterwards and it was going to be to some romantic fancy restaurant and you were gonna fall in love with me and—well, that’s not exactly how it worked out.”

“Bro.” Seongwoo’s laughing, a little bit in love with the way Daniel’s large hands fidget with the hem of his shirt. “You think I care? I had some grand plan to get you to come to one of my performances and have Jonghyun persuade you to buy roses for me just so I could give you one right back and say some cheesy shit like ‘you’re the star of my heart’ or something, but that didn’t happen either, so I think we’re even.”

“Are we even for the injuries, as well? I make a starving and broke college student fall off a treadmill and buy him dinner to make up for it?”

Seongwoo smirks, and he’s not sure where he gets the courage but he reaches out to tug Daniel forward by his hips until he presses his back into the wall of the building, Daniel just in front of him. “Oh, we’re even for the injuries. But you owe me for lying about your name, and just your phone number isn’t gonna cut it, since I’m counting that as part of the date.”

“We’ve been over this—”

“And,” Seongwoo adds, reaching with one hand to cup Daniel’s cheek, letting a tiny smile cross his lips, “I know exactly how I want you to pay for it.”

Daniel gets the message; his lips are soft, and he kisses sweetly, tastes like strawberries and the chocolate cake they split for dessert. Pressed chest to chest, able to feel Daniel’s heartbeat through their thin tank-tops, Seongwoo lets himself linger a few moments more than he usually does for a first kiss.

When he finally pulls back Daniel runs a thumb down the side of Seongwoo’s face, gentle over the band-aid stuck there, and grins when Seongwoo brushes caramel hair out of Daniel’s face. “Now are we even?”

Seongwoo considers it for a moment, scrunching his face in an exaggerated pout. “I suppose I’ll have to find new ways to get you to owe me so you can keep taking me on dates.”

“If it means more time like this,” Daniel says, ducking in for another quick kiss, “I’ll settle for being in debt, as long as my creditor’s terms are fair.”

“Don’t worry.” Seongwoo pokes Daniel’s chest. “I’m the fairest.”

“In the land, sure.” Daniel’s running (as much as he can with his foot in a temporary cast) before Seongwoo can compose himself enough to respond, and so he leans against the building and buries his face in his hands, and stays like that until his phone chimes. It’s from Daniel (more specifically, it’s from _Swoledemort_ because they’re both idiots), and doesn’t help Seongwoo regain his composure at all.

_You owe me for my injuries as well. I’m free Friday night, and that way you can pay this time._

**Author's Note:**

> exercising actually does help with production of serotonin, which helps regulate mood and therefore reduces depression and anxiety. exercise regularly, kids, unlike i do.  
> identity/role confusion and intimacy/isolation are two of the stages of erik erikson's stages of development. teenagers are going through identity vs. role confusion, so they either figure out who they are as a person or end up with sort of a fake identity/struggle with accepting who they really are. young adults, typically college-age to a little older, are in the intimacy vs. isolation stage, in which they either find people they can be intimate with or find themselves isolated. this is, of course, general and likely not accurate for many people, but it is a widely accepted theory of development.  
> if you want some more psych facts i can regurgitate my ap psych notes and google. come talk to me about them on tumblr @parkminihyuk.


End file.
